In a printer, it is desired for each sheet of media to be aligned as accurately as possible when it enters a print mechanism (process station) of the printer. In inkjet printers, this alignment has primarily been accomplished by employing two pick rolls feeding each sheet of media from a stack of sheets into a feed roll nip and then backing the fed sheet up to align it with the feed mechanism feeding the sheet through the feed roll nip to the print mechanism.
Another alignment arrangement in an inkjet printer has fed each sheet of media from the two pick rolls into counter-rotating rolls, which are reversed after the sheet is ready to be fed to the print mechanism. The counter-rotating rolls enable the sheet to straighten its leading edge to some extent before the directions of the counter-rotating rolls are reversed.
Each of these arrangements has used the two pick rolls to maintain each sheet of media as straight as possible as the condition in which it was loaded. These arrangements have utilized two edge guides for engaging the two sides of each sheet of the media with at least one of the two edge guides being adjustable. This has required the user to load a stack of sheets against one of the edge guides, usually permanently fixed, and have the other, adjustable edge guide bearing against the opposite side of the stack of sheets.
If the adjustable edge guide is not firmly engaged with the side of the stack of sheets by the user and the sides of the sheets of the stack are not in contact along their entire length with the fixed edge guide, then the sheet will be skewed when advanced by the two pick rolls from the stack. As a result, the sheet may enter the print mechanism in a skewed condition, notwithstanding the previously suggested skew correction arrangements, because of the adjustable guide not being firmly retained against the side of each sheet, for example.